I have inherited a suberb Kitchen Aid K45 that has the niggling problem of either being off or going full tilt. Being a strong advocate of the three R's (Recycle, Repair and Reuse) I believe the misguided unit is worthy of our attention. I've taken the motor head apart as far as I can without any beer on board...that is to say not very far...just the back cover. It looks like the orbital gear head will need to come off before the motor can be removed to expose the switch mechanism. It also appears there is a micro switch that supplies the ON/OFF function and the speed lever on the outside runs some sort of rheostat that controls the motor RPM.

If you would be so kind as to enlighten me, is this problem something that you've dealt with in the past? Is it possible to repair the unit and still keep the suds-o-meter at 1 or under? Any enlightenment would be most appreciated.

OK, so I'm about half way through my second beer and I have the motor removed from the base and the switch mechanism exposed. However, I don't see any obvious reason for the malfunction. Has anyone worked on one of these switches and could you tell me what should I be looking for?

I've tried looking up switch parts for this unit, but the parts search engine on this site doesn't include a category for stand mixers under Kitchen Aid. Is it possible the parts might be listed under another manufacturer?

All righty, then. While the information provided was useful, the solution to my speed control problem was not addressed in any of the threads. The route I took definately hit three on the ol' suds-0-meter because I took the motor off the stand, removed the govenor plate, monkeyed with the adjustment of the points and in general poked and probed everywhere...until I noticed a big capacitor shielded by a cardborad tube and tucked in over the top of govenor plate. When all as was said and done, I wouldn't have had to crack a beer to do this one. The problem was the capacitor that was wired in-line was shorted. The part could have been replaced by simply taking off the back cover (1 screw) and undoing two wire nuts.

The motor head is laying upside down in this picture. The capacitor (enclosed in the cardboard tube) is actually at the top of the opening when the cover is taken off. The Whirlpool part number for the capacitor is 4160325.